Over the past decades developments in passive safety devices have resulted in a significant reduction of fatalities and injuries in road accidents. A further reduction is expected from intelligent safety devices that use anticipatory sensors like radar, camera or infrared. In these so-called pre-crash sensing (PCS) systems the time-span between observation of a possible crash event and the actual occurrence is used to increase the effectiveness of the safety device. The safety devices may include modules for vehicle control, adaptable interior or exterior structures, restraint systems or any combinations of these. For the development of the PCS systems, new numerical tools and test methods such as improvements in the designing of the sensor system have been commonly known.
The pre-crash sensing (PCS) system typically utilizes a sensor system for detecting objects in front of a vehicle or platform. In general, a platform can be any of a wide range of bases, including a boat, a plane, an elevator, or even a stationary dock or floor. The sensor system may include radar, an infrared sensor or another detector. In any event, the sensor system generates an image of an object and the background. By processing that imagery, dimensions of the object can be detected.
Furthermore, the pre-crash sensing (PCS) system uses object dimensions (width, height and length) to support classification of detected objects. The distributions of typical vehicle and pedestrian heights are too similar to use for robust classification. Length is a less reliable feature, since it is only observable for objects in side lanes (large angles) at close distances, and thus cannot discriminate between classes at most locations. With distributions are more discriminating across the set of potential classification categories and serve as valuable features, requiring a good width estimation algorithm.
Therefore, there is a need in the art to provide a pre-crash sensing system that provides accurate determinations as to the presence of a potential collision target. In particular, it would be desirable to provide a system that takes into consideration the edges of the object in order to obtain its width.